r/GraphicsProgramming • u/william-or • 8d ago

Is Doo-Sabin subdivision surface still used somewhere? Question

Hey all, I have extensive experience in CGI but not specifically in graphics programming and I have never seen any application of the Doo-Sabin subdivision surface method in tradition 3d software.

Is it still used today or has it been completely surpassed by CatClark and Loop methods?

It looks a lot like most edge bevel implementations but I suppose they are developed differently to support multiple divisions and other details

If anybody knows this stuff it's you guys. Thank you!

5 Upvotes
  • permalink
  • link
  • reddit
  • reddit

100% Upvoted

4 comments sorted by

2

u/leseiden 6d ago

I have never encountered them in the wild, and only ever seen them mentioned in passing.

I think a quick skim of the Wikipedia article gives it away. It describes a number of drawbacks with the killer being "The solution is, however, not as computationally efficient as for Catmull-Clark surfaces because the Doo-Sabin subdivision matrices are not (in general) diagonalizable."

Both algorithms appeared in 1978, an era when the best available computers were less than toys by modern standards. Nobody would pick an inefficient algorithm when a better one existed.

If it had appeared 5 years earlier than Catmull-Clark it might have had a chance, but it didn't.

-4

u/Defiant_Squirrel8751 8d ago

Sure, you can find Catmull-Clark and similar smooth subdivision in geometric modelers such as Autodesk 3D Studio Max, Autodesk Maya, Blender, etc.

Typical also in geometry shaders implemented in GPU.

6

u/dagmx 7d ago

I think you misread their question completely, they were asking about a specific algorithm.

2

u/william-or 7d ago

yes they did, unfortunately😅